Lifting and releasing simultaneously.

(Baonghean) - Immediately after the popular TV program "24-Hour News" featured the "Vietnamese Dictionary for Students" by author Vu Chat, I searched all over the city hoping to see and acquire a genuine copy of this unique and bizarre work. Unfortunately, despite scouring every nook and cranny, all I received were repeated rejections.

There are several different versions of this dictionary.

Could it be that others were quicker than me? This dictionary, supposedly a bestseller, suddenly became incredibly popular. It's true that no one can stop popularity. This kind of popularity, like the one described in the Vietnamese folk tale, relentlessly and effortlessly turned it into a rarity! In the past, people bought it to study, to enrich their knowledge, to expand their vocabulary, to acquire some literacy. Now, people collect it to read, or more accurately, to look at it, to satisfy their curiosity, and of course, to laugh! Indeed, in recent days, the "Vietnamese Dictionary for Students," a VIP book that even made it into the National Library's reference catalog, compiled by Vu Chat, has led the public from one astonishment to another.

It is known that this dictionary was published by Nha Xuat Ban Tre (Youth Publishing House) in 2001 and is housed in the National Library (31 Trang Thi Street, Hanoi) with the catalog number VN01.01948, size 8x13cm, publication plan registration number 15/67 issued by the Publishing Department on January 4, 2001, and publication plan summary number 106/2001, with a print run of 1,000 copies. Initially, that seemed to be the only copy, but it turns out it's not a unique edition! There's also another printed copy of "Vietnamese Dictionary for Students" by author Vu Chat, bearing the label of Thanh Nien Publishing House, publication plan registration number 247-153 issued by the Publishing Department on March 1, 1999, printed at Ben Tre Printing Enterprise and submitted for copyright registration in August 2000. And that's not all! Most recently, Vu Chat's "Vietnamese Dictionary for Students" was published by Hong Duc Publishing House in 2013 and released in a record quantity of 15,000 copies.

So, it's probably based on facts and not a false accusation. Shock, anger, bitterness, and ridicule are the undivided emotional responses of anyone who happens to read it.

To save readers' time, the author would like to quote some "classic" content from this so-called "Vietnamese dictionary":

- Innocence is naivety

- Lovers are close friends.

- The station chief is the station commander.

- A castle is a tower or temple.

- Scratching and clawing: simultaneously scratching and clawing

- Massage: kneading and squeezing

- Closing: the performance ends.

- Identity: natural color

- Light bulb: The bulb is made from a bottle with a filament that is heated by electricity.

- Gravestone: a stone slab inscribed with the name and date of death placed before the grave.

- Where do you sit down?

- Fertilizing means applying fertilizer to plants...

Perhaps it's beyond words. Horrible! Since I haven't seen the book in person, I'm not sure exactly how the author defined the word "horrible." Of course, in my reasoning, we shouldn't rule out the possibility of it being "both horrifying and terrifying." I wonder how many people will be left feeling utterly disgusted after reading just a small excerpt from this "massive scientific work"? Probably many!

If this hodgepodge were to become a book, it would be hopeless. But I'm glad it's survived for 15 years. And it's even been reprinted several times, how glorious! I don't believe the censors were so naive as to not notice its strangeness if they had read it at least once. Surely no one is that incompetent, especially those "specialists in nitpicking" like the censorship agency. The only explanation is either negativity or irresponsibility. Only irresponsibility would fail to read it, because not reading it is the only way to detect it. Through this incident, we learn even more about how much superficiality and indifference to work can become! So many years, so many "doors," layers upon layers of barriers, and a large salaried staff, all to allow such harmful products to slip through so brazenly? If someone hadn't "posted it on Facebook," how much longer would the National Library have cherished it? How many generations of students will no longer be poisoned? And how many more reprints will there be...?

Blaming the author isn't enough. The real sadness lies in the fact that it's like "an elephant squeezing through a needle's eye." Is it ignorance or intelligence? The censorship mechanism is so ironic. Careless, utterly careless! If presented in the style of Mr. Vu Chat's dictionary, then... it's both careless and lax!

Nguyen Khac An